Our third-grade teacher was very concerned about our
posture. Day after day she would command her students to
watch their posture. “Sit with your back straight and your
feet flat on the floor; don’t slump in your seat.” “Stand erect,
with your weight equally distributed on both feet; don’t
slouch.” “When you read, hold your book with the light
coming over your right shoulder.” Mind you, that was before
the days of doing your homework by the flickering light of a
television set! “Walk on the balls of your feet.” She noticed
everything. Posture was all-important to this teacher of
mine. She watched us constantly and corrected the way we
walked and sat and stood; and if she had been able to come
to our homes at night, I am sure she would also have given
us advice on how to lie down!
My teacher seemed a bit of a fanatic to us when we were
eight years old and thought we had infinite flexibility. Now,
nearly six decades later, I see her point. Or maybe I should
say, I feel her point, right here in the small of my back!
Posture is important. And what we do with our walking and
sitting and standing is going to have much to do with our
physical health. But if the Bible is to be believed, walking
and sitting and standing are also markers of our spiritual
health. Marcia Jean Tucker learned this lesson and learned
it well. Walking, sitting, standing – her life will teach us
healthy spiritual posture.
I
First, Marcia taught us to pay attention to the way we walk.
Marcia taught us, as the saying goes, to “walk the walk and
not just talk the talk.” Marcia Tucker’s witness is that walking
in integrity is a good thing, but it cannot be done on your
own. If you would walk in integrity, you must also walk in
faithfulness to God. You must trust God, or else your
attempt to walk in integrity is doomed to failure.
The Psalmist confirms this when he says:
.. for I have walked in my integrity, and I have trusted in the LORD
without wavering. ... I walk in faithfulness to you.
Walking in integrity means walking in faithfulness and
trusting God without wavering. Have you ever done a “trust
walk”? A trust walk is an exercise we use to teach people
that others will take care of them. If I were to lead you
through a trust walk, I would blindfold you, and then begin to
give you instructions: “Walk straight ahead; turn right when I
tell you to; turn around and walk backward until I stop you.”
Well, most of you would not feel comfortable doing that. You
wouldn’t be sure you could really trust my judgment or my
intent to keep you from harm. You would likely feel you had
to tear off that blindfold and see for yourself where you were
heading. You would want to walk on your own.
But the Bible teaches us to trust walk with God. If we are
going to walk in integrity, we are also going to have to walk in
faithfulness and trust God. We are in blindfolds, and the only
way we can walk the walk without stumbling and falling is to
trust our guide. Marcia Tucker came to that conclusion. She
had always been concerned with integrity. As a law
enforcement student and then as an immigration officer, she
knew that she had to be a model of integrity for others. She
walked that walk to the best of her ability, but found one
spring day that she could no longer walk it alone. She had to
trust God. And so, though she had worshiped here for some
twenty years, but had never trusted Christ as her savior, on
Palm Sunday of 1998 her walk of integrity became a walk
down this very aisle, where she professed her faith in Christ
as her savior and Lord. She found in Him the power to walk
with real integrity.
Marcia learned, and now Marcia would teach us, that walking
in integrity is not something you can do on your own; you
must walk in faithfulness to God. You must trust Christ as
your guide.
II
But my third-grade teacher was not only concerned about the
way we walked. If anything, she was even more concerned
about the way we sat. We were not to drape ourselves over
chairs or to scoot down in our seats, trying to hide so that we
would not be called on. We were to sit up straight, with our
feet planted firmly on the floor. And if we protested that
other people slumped and let their bodies go limp, she would
announce, quite definitely, that we were not “other people”,
we were her students, and in this class we do not sit lazily.
We sit properly! No two ways about it!
That’s pretty close to what Marcia Tucker felt about where
she would sit. That’s very close to what the Psalmist
reminds us about how we should sit:
I do not sit with the worthless, nor do I consort with hypocrites; I
hate the company of evildoers, and will not sit with the wicked.
Marcia understood that she could call us to accountability.
She did not have time to play the games of those of us who
were not on target. She would not sit down with worthless
ideas, or consort with hypocritical promises. She would not
sit down and condone wrong-doing. She called us to
accountability.
As an immigration officer, she was often confronted with
situations that required a firm perspective. But she would
not sit down and deal with those who had chosen to break
the law.
As a mother, Janette has reported that Marcia would tell her
straight out what she needed to be doing. Always loving and
caring, but firm and clear – she was not going to sit down
with anything unworthy.
One of her brothers told me that early on she was very clear
about the things he needed to do in his family life. She was
not about to sit down with anything less that what was right.
And not long ago I too learned that she was not prepared to
sit back and take “no” for an answer. She called to ask the
church to provide something for her. I hemmed and hawed a
bit about her request; I tried to tell her that the particular
committee that handled what she wanted was not functioning
at this time. I thought I would hear words of sympathy: “I
understand, pastor, you are doing the best you can.” No,
what I heard was, “What’s up with that? That’s not the way
Takoma should work!”. She was not going to sit back and
take mediocrity from her church.
Oh, thank God for a spirit like Marcia Tucker’s – a spirit that
challenges us to be our best, for she will not easily tolerate
less than the best! Thank God for a voice like Marcia’s, that
will not let us get away with sloppiness! And thank God for a
posture like Marcia’s, that will not sit down and join the
worthless and the hypocritical things of this world. She
walked in integrity, trusting God; and she would not sit with
the worthless.
III
But I am grateful not only for Marcia’s walk, and I am thankful
not only for where she sat; I am also gratified by how she
stood. For standing is the most complex and the most
human of all postures. We are the creatures who stand up
on our hind legs and announce to the world that we are here,
ready to move, on our way. And so I am grateful that in
Marcia Tucker’s life I can see footprints that let me know
where she stood, and, better yet, where she now stands.
Walking in integrity may be glorious; not sitting with the
worthless is right on target; but standing – there is something
special. The Psalmist concludes his witness:
But as for me, I walk in my integrity; redeem me, and be gracious to
me. My foot stands on level ground; in the great congregation I will
bless the LORD.
“My foot stands on level ground.” Brothers and sisters, when
you walk in integrity, trusting God for your strength and
Christ for your guide; when you refuse to sit down in the
mess; then the day comes when you will be able to stand up,
stand tall, and stand steady. On level ground. On the higher
plane. In a place where everybody can see and know who
you are and to whom you belong.
Marcia Tucker stood up. She stood up for Christ and
blessed Him in the great congregation; on Pentecost
Sunday, 1998, she came through the waters of baptism, right
here, with seven other candidates. Five of them were
teenagers, two were young adults, and then there was
Marcia. I remember her remarking that she was older than
all the rest, and she should have done this before now, but
that was all right. She was taking her stand. Her foot stood
on level ground, steady and firm, even when it was planted in
the waters of baptism.
Marcia Tucker stood up. She stood up for Christ and
blessed Him in the great congregation. In October of that
same year she attended our revival services and brought
Kenneth Henderson along. Kenneth stepped out and took
this walk and trusted Christ. He had seen Marcia stand up
and bless Christ. Her foot stood on solid ground that night,
and another precious soul saw and was strengthened to take
his own stand.
Marcia Tucker stood up then, and she will stand again. She
will stand again. She will stand today on higher ground. The
Lord has heard her prayer, “Lord, lift me up and let me stand,
by faith, on heaven’s table land. A higher plane that I have
found; Lord, let me stand on higher ground.” Do not be
deceived by what you see. It appears that Marcia is lying
down; and we, it is true, speak of laying her to rest. But she
is not lying down. This is only the outward shell of who she
really is. The real Marcia is standing at the throne of the
eternal one, standing in the greatest congregation of them
all, the company of those who have trusted Christ. Make no
mistake; she stands today, on level ground.
And there is more. For we know that at the last day, when
the trumpet shall resound and time shall be no more, there
will be a great getting’-up morning, and the dead in Christ
shall rise and stand. They shall find strength in weak backs,
they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.
They shall stand at the latter day upon the earth; they shall
stand.
Marcia, you have great posture! You have walked in
integrity, trusting God. You have not sat down with the
hopelessly unworthy. And you have stood to give your
witness in the great congregation. So shall you stand. So
shall you know the power of the one who was counted out,
slain and slaughtered, but who on the third day stood up, set
aside the cold and the stone of the tomb, and walked out
from the grip of death. You will hear it, and you will respond,
when He calls your name: Marcia Jean Tucker, stand up!
Stand up! For you know all about walking and sitting and
standing.
